Memorial Day

“Play the Blood Stained Banner - play Murder Most Foul”. BD

Dusty Tracks— Bob Dylan

Monday morning, at 8:45, the bells will ring, as they always do at that time, at the Shrine of St.Joseph in Long Hill, NJ. That seems like the right place to start Memorial Day. We will gather to honor the lost lives, the heroic lives and to remember that they gave their lives to the cause and the flag. Those people who died on 9/11, and since, were the innocent soldiers in a universal battle that has been waged since the beginning of time. The parades that honor the fallen are the reminder that this battle is never over and peace is won or lost on the battlefield and not in the realm of ideas. Throughout history, peace is simply the absence of war.

There are many influential people who cannot accept the fallibility of all cultures and all people. They are more than willing to point out our own failures but fail to see the rest of the world’s failures. The Boss fell into this trap in Great Britain just this past week. It is easy to call Trump an authoritarian type because he is that kind of person. No one is currently being arrested in the US for a meme or a political statement. Twelve Thousand people were arrested and charged in Great Britain in 2023. Is that where we want to go?

Frankly, we cannot understate that there is a significant percentage of people between 20 and 30 who see the world in a binary manner and are unable to understand the present because they have no understanding of history. There are seemingly only two groups of people, oppressors and oppressed, that one can belong to. Choose the wrong side and some activists advocate on social media that violence is justified. America is an oppressor nation but somehow Russia is not. Israel is a colonialist country but Iran is a peaceful religious nation.

We allow this sort of battle of ideas across our platforms. How are you going to sue for damages because of someone’s posts. The two innocent young adults who were gunned down in DC cannot be connected directly to the terrorist’s follows. If you were a prosecutor would you also arrest the poster who “motivated” the murderer to commit the heinous act? As Dylan would say “it is what it is, a murder most foul”. Life is more complicated than we were ever taught and it is painful to think about the darkness. This is the part of becoming an adult that some of us prefer to avoid.

The tragedy this week found me turning to Dylan’s Rough and Rowdy Ways. All of the songs from this 2019 album have something to say about the culture, the sins and values of our country. This is a country that killed more of our own in a Civil War than in all foreign wars. It was 100 years later before we had a Civil Rights Act. We displaced an entire population of indigenous people. Was that an American genocide? We dropped an atomic bomb on an entire city of non combatants. This is a country that assassinated it’s own President in 1963. We killed over 100,000 Muslims in Iraq for no good reason. We abandoned the women and children of Afghanistan in 2021.

We opened our gates to the world’s poor and hungry. We saved the world twice in the twentieth century from imperialism and fascism. We gave the planet Rock, Blues, Jazz, Country and Rap. We have guaranteed the rights of all Americans, regardless of sex and ethnicity. America has given the individual the greatest chance to succeed because of your own genius and hard work. America allowed anyone to worship in any manner that they chose. Remember the Shakers! The freedom to fashion one’s future, regardless of social class, is the protein of our culture. From Edison to Salk to Musk, we are the leaders in propelling the world forward.

Our country has always been an experiment that was designed to give the citizens the best chance to express fairness, compassion, loyalty, sanctity and authority. The beauty of our culture is that we have converted sanctity and loyalty to God into a value of tolerance for the other. The journey to that point has had highs and lows. Ask Bobby Kennedy. Ask Richard Nixon. Ask Ronald Reagan who helped tear down the wall of Communism. Over 100 million people were released from the domination of Russia. Today, Poland enjoys the best economy and best living standard in the European Union. Ask Obama who was elected twice. Ask the new citizen why he came here and why she is proud to declare herself an American.

All Americans value the daily freedoms we enjoy. This is the place on the planet where Hindu, Muslim, Jew, Christian and Buddhist can find common cause. There was no confusion for most Americans on 9/11. We do not see the world as a battle between good and evil or the oppressed versus the oppressors. We experienced the loss equally. We see the world as place where we just want to work and live in peace with each other. Enjoy each citizen and the family at the ball game or the butcher shop. We do not care who you sleep with or who you marry. Earn your own way in this world without anger. Care for the less fortunate.

We should be alarmed by the direction that some of our citizens have taken. The lack of tolerance and respect, for the other and the simple values, has been threatened by the ancient devils that lie dormant in everyone’s heart. The ability to project one’s own guilt on the so called other is the fuel of the violent radical. Westerners have been taught for the last thirty years that they are guilty of genocide, white supremacy and ethnic cleansing because some of your ancestors three hundred years ago were judged guilty of the same failings. The only way one can alleviate the guilt, for those affected by this psychological contagion, is to protest lawlessly, and even kill, the people that you resent. If you know one of these characters have them meet me Monday morning in Long Hill or take them to a Memorial Day parade and teach them that America has a good heart, even after a “murder most foul”.

Peace to Everyone..

In Honor of Sarah Lynn Milgrim and Yaron Lischinsky.

May their memories be a blessing!